


Blood in the Water

by IFuckingLoveBees



Series: Loose Ends [6]
Category: Treasure Planet (2002)
Genre: Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Betrayal, Implied/Referenced Underage Sex, Jim has trust issues, M/M, Not Canon Compliant, Threats of Rape/Non-Con, Threats of Violence, the fun smutty times are on hold unfortunately, this one is mostly plot tbh
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-26
Updated: 2020-08-09
Packaged: 2021-03-06 03:41:08
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Underage
Chapters: 4
Words: 20,192
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25536748
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/IFuckingLoveBees/pseuds/IFuckingLoveBees
Summary: He knew, almost from the start, that Silver was bad news. He knew something was deeply wrong, and he still allowed himself to get close. Every step of this journey was a mistake, but nothing more than getting attached. Silver lied to him, yes, but more than anything he lied to himself.
Relationships: Jim Hawkins/John Silver
Series: Loose Ends [6]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1315481
Comments: 30
Kudos: 99





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Y’all ready to fucking cry?
> 
> As you can see, I am not dead. Quarantine did, however, absolutely and totally kick my ass, including destroying both my time and motivation to write. Which is why this is so late despite the fact that I’ve been working on it for longer than any of the rewrites. That, and the fact that this is plot heavy/story driven, and I’ve been relying a little too heavily on my smut writing skills lately.
> 
> (PSA: Please don't take anything that isn't explicitly educational (here or anywhere else) as sex ed or sex advice, if you want to learn more you can visit this page [here](https://archiveofourown.org/works/25863418) where I've linked some good resources for sexual health and education. Stay safe.)

He’s played this game a dozen times by now, chasing Morph around and searching him out when he decides to hide as something innocuous. It should be near impossible, with how good the mimicry is, for Jim to find the blob at all, but Morph has a bad habit of peeking when he thinks Jim isn’t looking and often gives himself away. 

Stalking through the empty galley is not how he’d ideally like to spend his morning, but it’s better than his chores by a long shot. Jim checks all Morph’s favorite spots first, using his peripheral vision more than directly looking. A barely audible giggle sounds from a few feet away, and he sneaks toward the sound until he’s peering into the nearly empty barrel that had once held a journey’s worth of purps. 

One of the fruits cracks an eye at him, and Jim yells as he dives for the shapeshifter. 

He underestimates the depth of the barrel and ends up falling entirely inside, crashing against the floor and scrambling to catch Morph before he can flit off to hide somewhere else. The space is more than enough to house him comfortably, and he takes a moment to tickle the little imp before he tries to clamber out.

The sound of someone descending the stairs makes him take pause, at first because he’s not keen to be found hiding in a barrel should one of the less than charitable crewmembers spot him. More footsteps fill the room, and Jim frowns to himself and peers curiously out of the tiny airhole in the middle of the barrel. 

Several of the crew have gathered and are talking among themselves. He can’t make out what they’re saying at first, but soon the gravity of the situation hits him, the fact that there’s something wrong here, and that he’s the unintentional witness to all of it. 

“There’s only three left.” One of the crew points out. 

“We are wanting to move.” Another adds, and it’s now that Jim realizes how impatient they all sound.

And then Jim’s heart stops. He didn’t even realize Silver was in the room, but when he speaks it’s like a punch to the gut. 

“We don’t move ‘til we have the treasure.” He growls, baring his teeth at the crew.

Jim tries not to breathe as a hiss sounds from above. 

“I say we kill them all now.” Scroop sneers, and when he slides into Jim’s view he’s grinning vindictively enough to make the boy shudder.

Silver whirls on the spider and catches him by the throat. He snarls in his face, threat and menace clear in his tone. 

“Disobey my orders again like that stunt you pulled with Mr. Arrow and so help me you’ll be joining him!” 

The entire crew flinches as one as Scroop is thrown across the room and slammed against the purp barrel, and Jim claps a hand to his own mouth to keep from yelping.

“Strong talk.” Scroop says while righting himself. “But I know otherwise.”

The entire crew turn to him, intrigued, and Jim thinks he sees a flicker of fear on Silver’s face. He schools his expression to neutral too quickly for anyone else to notice, but when he replies it’s in a tone too casual to be anything but false.

“You got something to say, Scroop?”

The grin on his face when he turns around is downright venomous, even from behind where Jim can see. He’s holding a purp past its prime, rolling it in his claws delicately.

“It’s that boy.” He says, enunciating every syllable clearly to the room. 

Jim feels his blood run cold. 

“Methinks you have a soft spot for him.” Scroop continues, stabbing the tip of his claw into the fruit as if to illustrate his point. 

Jim shakes his head mutely, fear and heartbreak threatening to overtake him. He knows what’s coming, what Silver is about to do, but knowing an injury is impending does nothing to soothe the pain when it hits.

“Now mark me, the lot of you!” Silver snaps at the nearest crewman. “I care about one thing and one thing only.” He stabs a finger into the table to make his point.

“Flint’s trove! You think I’d give it all up for the sake of some, nose wiping little whelp?”

“Oh, what was it now?” Scroop sneers, disbelief and condescension in his voice. “Oh, you got the makin’s a greatness in ya.” He mocks. 

“Shut yer mouth!” Silver growls, and Jim flinches at how quickly and easily he denies it. “I cozied up to the kid to keep him off our scent.” 

The dread that’s been creeping up on him all morning hits like a blow to the chest, leaving him breathless and silent with agony. Because Silver may have lied to him, but Jim was foolish enough to believe it, and that’s what hurts so much about this. Not the betrayal, but knowing that he’s once again just some dumb kid who dared to think someone might care about him.

Jim bites his palm to keep quiet, to keep from making noise as tears are sliding down his cheeks. 

“Oh, yes, I’m sure the two of you got very cosy after all those nights together.” Scroop hisses, a smirk clearly audible in his voice. 

He hears the way Silver’s breath hitches on a sharp intake, and Jim just barely forces himself to peek out the hole in the barrel again to watch. He doesn’t know why he does it, maybe some hopeless desire for Silver to take it all back, maybe just a masochistic need to watch his own betrayal happen before his eyes.

The crew are silent, watching Silver very carefully, and the look on his face is as close to frightened as Jim has ever seen it.

“Tell me, Captain,” Scroop sneers with false honey in his voice. “Did you have to force the boy to suck your cock, or was he so eager to please that it was his own idea?”

Silver’s chest rumbles with another low growl, and Scroop continues the jeering all too gladly. 

“I’m sure he was good enough, for a first-timer. There is something so sweet about a virgin’s mouth, isn’t there? Though, I’ll wager the crew are more than willing to teach the boy some proper manners.” 

A ripple of cruel laughter filters through the crowd, and Jim watches with stinging eyes as Silver’s expression goes from nearly murderous to cool and unaffected in the blink of an eye. 

“You want him? Use him for whatever you like.” He says to the crew at large, who appear stunned by this heel-turn. Silver takes two large steps to be in the middle of the room, squared off against Scroop who is still grinning like this was his plan all along. 

The grin is abruptly wiped off his face when Silver picks him up and slams him chest first into the floor.

“ _After_ he’s shown us where the treasure is.” He snarls, eye flashing red and Scroop gasping like he’s had the wind knocked out of him. 

A call from the crow’s nest draws every eye in the room, and within seconds all the assembled crew are rushing out on deck to be the first to set eyes on their destination. 

Jim feels like his heart has been cut out of his chest. He gasps and gulps for air, clawing at his shirt and fighting back tears. _Why_ , why did he have to follow Silver that night? He knew from the start that he was being lied to, why did he let it happen?

Because he’s in love, and he thought (prayed, _hoped_ ) that he was loved back.

Clambering out of the barrel feels like walking to the gallows, which, Jim supposes, isn’t far from the truth. He’s under no illusions about what will happen to him if he’s caught by the crew, not anymore. 

Despite everything, despite the fear and adrenaline telling him to _run, flee, go,_ Jim allows himself a moment to grieve. His exhale is shuddery with the threat of tears and he stumbles, supporting himself on the table and taking a few heaving breaths that will turn into full body sobs if he stays here much longer.

He dashes for the stairs, intent on sneaking past the crew while they’re distracted. The ship’s approach is likely to keep them occupied for some time, he reasons, but the sooner he moves the better.

It turns out he doesn’t get that far. 

He freezes with his foot on the bottom step, staring up at the shadow that has fallen over him. He’s shaking, the faintest tremble present in his hands, but he doesn’t notice. His mind has gone flat. The terror of seeing Silver, this man who he thought he understood in a new and terrible light wars with the instinctual blanket of comfort that his presence provides.

He wants to try and dodge around the older man, to sprint for the Captain’s cabin or die trying, but his fight or flight has stopped working. 

Somewhere in the back of his mind, Jim recognises that Silver looks stunned to see him as well. The older man’s eyes flicker back to the crew on deck, a flash of panic coloring his gaze before Jim startles away as he takes a step towards him.

He backs up into the galley, trying to keep his front to Silver and walking backwards in the process. Silver is stalking after him, herding the boy into the shadows of the galley with an utterly unreadable expression. Jim stumbles as he clips one of the tables, turning to catch himself and ending up pinned in place as the pirate advances slowly.

He’s approaching like Jim is a skittish animal, body language calm but the coiled tenseness in his muscles is telling; he’s ready to catch the boy if he makes a run for it.

Jim’s hand bumps against something where it’s scrambling over the table desperately, and his palm closes around the small crescent blades of a pair of wire clippers. He tucks it close to his back, hoping Silver hadn’t noticed him grab it and glancing at the stairs. Even gauging the distance he knows he’s fucked. If he had made a run for it quicker then perhaps he could have slipped by, but Silver is closing in on him with such deliberate slowness that Jim knows he’s cornered. 

He sucks in a painful lungful of air and readies himself. If he can dodge Silver grabbing for him then he can sink the clippers in and he’ll have a tiny opening to run for it. It won’t be easy, but it’s possible he could make it to the Captain before the rest of the crew catch on.

Except he flinches at the idea of stabbing Silver in the metaphorical back like that. Even though the older man has already done the same to him, even though he’s likely fighting for his life, Jim can’t bring himself to find the thought anything but upsetting. 

Silver finally steps within arm’s reach of him, and Jim studies the look on his face closely. It seems genuine, concern warring with the need to comfort, but in the light of his recent revelation he doesn’t believe a moment of it. The first contact between them makes the younger man flinch. It’s barely a brush of fingers against his shoulder, but he still jumps away as if struck, and in his hyperaware state he registers the devastated look on Silver’s face, as if he has any right to be hurt by the younger man’s reaction. 

Jim almost doesn’t believe his eyes as Silver takes a step back. He doesn’t even want to trust his own senses anymore, and the sight forces a flicker of suspicion to slip in among the fear and hurt. Silver doesn’t even say anything, like he already knows it’s useless. Jim won’t ever trust him again, and the resigned look on his face says he’s all too aware of that fact. 

A small jerk of his head towards the stairs is all the indication Jim gets, and he’s not about to let that opportunity pass him by. 

The adrenaline is still thundering in his ears as he races up the galley stairs, not even daring to look back. He’s not sure what he wants to see if he does, and what will make him run faster or stop altogether. The crew turn to face him as he sprints across the deck, but by the time they’re mobilising he’s already inside the Captain’s cabin. 

Amelia and Doppler appear to be having a nice quiet conversation when Jim bursts into the room. They’re both surprised to see him, and he notices Amelia start to scold him before she sees the obvious panic on his face and all the blood drains from hers. 

“Mister Hawkins?” She asks, standing up and sending her chair screeching backwards. 

Jim locks the door behind himself and collapses against it, shaking and fighting not to break down into desperate sobs. Morph is cooing and floating around him, confused.

“Pirates, the crew- they’re-” He gasps and shudders, utterly destroyed by this revelation. He’d finally opened up, finally decided to trust again, and now this. _Fuck_ he’s an idiot.

“We need to leave.” Amelia says, striding over to the cabinet and collecting a few of the weapons stored within. She reaches for the box holding the map and opens it, silent with shock when it isn’t there.

Jim pulls himself together just long enough to grab the map out of his pocket and hold it up to her. She stares between it and him with a grim expression, and he just looks back with blank misery.

“If we survive this, you and I are going to be having a few words.” She says, austere as ever. 

Jim nods mutely and tucks it away, taking one of the weapons from Amelia. She hands the other one over to Doppler, using her own rifle to bore a hole in the floor. He jumps away from the door as sparks begin to fly from it, snapping his head to watch with growing horror as the lock slowly begins to turn red from the heat.

Amelia grabs him by the scruff and drags both men into the makeshift trapdoor after her, racing down the hall towards the launch bay. 

There are still tears flowing down Jim’s cheeks in fits and starts. He trips over one of the crates lining the hall, nearly overbalancing in his rush to correct. Behind him there’s the sound of someone giving chase, heavy breath and thundering footfalls. The adrenaline is enough to keep him going, and Jim tumbles down the stairs as Amelia slams the door after him. Doppler and the Captain are loading into a lifeboat, and Jim scrambles for the door control. He has to put all of his strength into forcing the lever up, and then he’s running for the catwalk as the little skiff wheels out over the launch bay. 

Morph, who had been beside him the whole time, suddenly launches across the room, map in his mouth. Jim turns on his heel to follow the shapeshifter, chasing him down just as the door slams open and a barrage of gunfire echoes through the small space. 

The sight of the crew trying to edge their way into the room makes him even more desperate. Morph spots the approaching danger and drops the map, and Jim falls to his belly, catching it just inches before it rolls off the catwalk and out the bay doors below. He struggles to his feet, taking cover behind a crate as the crew notice his presence and start firing on him as well. One of the shots zips past the normally unshakable Morph, and Jim watches as he turns himself into a copy of the map in panic. 

The catwalk in the middle of the room collapses, and Jim watches his only chance of boarding the ship fall into the void, taking a few crewmembers with it. At the same time the longboat suddenly stops it’s movement, instead jolting in place before beginning to move backward, the bay doors closing beneath it.

He catches Amelia’s eye from across the room, and he sees the dread on her face. She could drop the lifeboat at any time, but she knows if she does Jim is doomed. She’s resigning them all to a grim fate, and Jim feels his heart clench in fear.

And for all his selfish tendencies before, Jim finally finds the strength to do something recklessly, stupidly, selfless. He takes the map in his hand and hurls it as far as it will go, watching Amelia catch it in her fist by pure impulse. He pulls out his gun and aims, noting with some hysteria that his hands are shaking.

The line wheeling the skiff out snaps when he shoots it, and the sudden increased load on the other cable takes it shortly after. The longboat drops, hitting the edge of the door before sliding down and out. He catches a glimpse of when the sail opens and the tiny vessel shoots into the distance, and then the bay is closed with a final sounding thud.

Jim hopes he lives long enough to give them time to escape.

* * *

It’s clear when the men grab him from his hiding spot that the way they were acting before was playing nice. Even with all the spite they held towards him before, the tacit irritation at his mere presence is worlds better than the crew taking their hostilities out on him openly. 

Jim grunts and pulls as he’s dragged roughly from behind the crates. Fighting them is only going to make it worse, but he can’t help it. It’s second nature at this point, to fight with all his strength. When he’s wrestled to his knees on the floor the abuse finally stops, and then Jim wishes he was back to getting beaten, because this is worse. 

He’s kneeling in front of the crew, with Silver at their head. It’s clear who the leader is, and who orchestrated this whole thing. His mouth twists in disgust, in knowing that it was all going on right under his nose and he had no clue. The fact that Silver was probably only using him is almost secondary to the pain of knowing this is his fault. He didn’t even have to be manipulated into it, every step of this was his idea, right down to nearly handing over the map. Anger bubbles up to replace the grief and Jim holds onto it, seething and forcing himself to direct the rage at Silver for getting him into this mess, because if he falters even for a second all that anger will collapse back down into sorrow and fury at himself. Because he knew, almost from the start, that Silver was bad news. He _knew_ something was deeply wrong, and he still allowed himself to get close. Every step of this journey was a mistake, but nothing more than getting attached. Silver lied to him, yes, but more than anything he lied to himself. 

Jim wants to be sick. 

It’s like staring at an entirely different person. The man he’s known for the past few months is nowhere to be seen, and Jim struggles to hide exactly how much that particular twist of the knife hurts him. He pulls against the crew holding him up, purely to feel like he’s doing something and not as helpless as he really is. The men either side of him are strong and don’t even waver as their captive fights with all his strength. 

Jim tenses up when a hand grabs him by the chin. Not because the touch is unfamiliar, but because it is painfully, achingly easy to remember the last time this happened under different circumstances, and how good it felt to have the breath kissed out of him. He looks up when Silver tilts his head back, if only grudgingly. The anger in his eyes is palpable and intense, but Silver just looks like he’s thinking. 

“Where’s the map, lad?” He asks in a low, dangerous voice that might have been appealing to Jim, a few hours ago. 

He doesn’t answer. There aren’t words to express how angry he is, and even if he says them the crew will just beat him for it. 

One of the men holding him slams a fist into his stomach anyway, barking an order to answer the Captain as Jim tries not to gag from the pain. He curls into himself, and would have collapsed completely if the men weren’t still holding him up. 

He glares when his head is yanked back by one of his handlers, hard enough to make his neck ache. Silver is still just staring at him impassively, like he couldn’t care less this is happening. 

“The map, Jim.” He says. His voice is still even, but Jim can hear the ghost of a growl underlying the words, and it’s enough to make his stubborn streak rear its head. 

“Fuck you.” He snaps, jolting forwards to get in Silver’s face. He doesn’t know why he’s doing this, provoking this man he knows for a fact is dangerous. 

The crewman to Jim’s left hits him in the gut again, knocking the wind out of him and making him wheeze sharply. 

Jim doesn’t even notice Silver leaning down until he’s close enough to grab the boy by the scruff. He tenses and tries to fight but a warning squeeze is enough to make him go still.

“Make this easier on yourself, lad.” He whispers.

He hates the way he shudders when the words reach him. It’s half a plea, the tone sharp enough for the men overhearing to mistake it for a threat but the words and the unspoken “ _please_ ” get the message across. 

Jim turns his eyes to meet Silver’s and glares, terrified out of his mind but unwilling to bend. 

Yet another blow to the stomach and tears spring to his eyes. He hopes vindictively that Silver witnessing this is even a fraction of the pain he’s currently experiencing. He hacks, half expecting a tinge of red when he spits. His abdomen certainly hurts enough for it, and it would serve them right, if they killed their only means to the treasure.

Jim wants to continue fighting, a part of him morbidly curious how far Silver is willing to go for the map. The pain in his middle is already enough to make him wince just standing on his knees, and he’s not sure he can take much more. Praying that Amelia and Doppler have made it somewhere safe, he hangs his head in defeat.

“Front pocket.”

Instantaneously the crew either side of him are digging through his clothes, one of them pulling out the sphere with a triumphant sound. 

Jim can’t help the bitter smile when the crew makes a collective noise of confusion. He’s staring at the floor, unwilling to let them see how scared he is. The silence afterwards is short lived, and Jim finally lifts his gaze just in time for the crew to turn their eyes from the now unaltered form of Morph to the boy who’s tricked them. 

He tries to dodge away but a blow is already aimed for his face. The first hit connects with a sharp crack and Jim cries out, feeling pain blossoming over his cheek even as the other crew are tearing into him with equal vigor. He falls, no longer supported by the men and with enough hits to disorient even a seasoned brawler. For Jim, young and inexperienced as he is, it brings him to the floor in seconds. He struggles, of course he does, but something wraps around his neck and squeezes and he realises that they’re actually going to kill him as he’s pulling at the appendage to no avail. The airflow is cut off slowly but surely, and Jim panics as his vision starts to go black and fuzzy and his limbs feel too heavy to lift.

“That’s enough!” Silver roars, loud enough that even Jim can hear him through the haze of terror and oxygen deprivation.

The crew scatter, leaving Jim gasping and coughing on the floor. The violent vitriol in the room is still thick enough to cut, but the crew aren’t willing to disobey their Captain, at least not yet. When he finally pulls himself together long enough to look, Jim finds Silver standing over him and looking only mildly irritated. Never before has the power imbalance been so stark. Just like that he’s a cabin boy again, nothing and nobody and his life in someone else's hands, and he hates it with all his strength. 

Silver kneels, leaning down and grabbing Jim by the collar, and he flinches. It’s old instinct, to shy away from the danger. 

“Where’s the map, Jim?” Silver asks again. His voice is even and untempered by rage.

Jim is not so unaffected. He grits his teeth and whips to stare the other man in the face, anger bubbling over into one final fuck you.

“Long gone by now.” He growls. He’s not sure what he hopes to see, looking into Silver’s eyes. Regret, maybe? Apology? Some sign, something to indicate it isn’t what it looks like. 

He doesn’t get one. Even in the face of defiance Silver remains stoic and unaffected. The only indication of emotion is the long exhale he lets out. 

Silver doesn’t even address Jim, instead turning to one of the crew and indicating the boy with a jerk of his head.

“Take him on deck.” 

Jim grunts as he’s hauled upright and dragged towards the stairs. 

The trip through the ship’s inside is a blur. Jim is angry, vitriol and unchecked rage simmering just under the surface. He feels numb, and only notices that something isn’t right when a heavy, coarse rope is tightened around his wrist. 

He struggles, refreshed terror and fear of what they’re going to do revitalizing his energy, but between the two strong crewmen Jim’s scrawny frame is barely an obstacle. His other wrist is bound, and then his arms are lifted above his head, tied against the main mast and baring his back to the deck, where some of the crew have gathered and are whispering among themselves. 

He has just enough room to twist his head around to look, and he spies when Scroop walks, sneering, out of the shadowy hold. The spider isn’t leering at him, but his gaze is full of malice none the less. He hisses to another crewman, something low that Jim doesn’t hear, but that sends the man scurrying away with an ominous smile. 

He approaches Jim, and though he wants to keep the spider in his sight, his position won’t allow it. Jim jerks away when the spider’s claws grab his shirt, writhing in his restraints and fighting against what he knows cannot be good. 

The air is cool where it hits his back, and Jim shouts in indignant fear as Scroop rips the article to reveal his spine and shoulders working frantically to try and escape.

“Now, now, cabin boy.” Scroop hisses. “It will be less painful if you stay still.” 

The words don’t give Jim comfort. He twists his neck as far as it will go and catches a glance of Scroop’s face, and the treacherous grin there chills his blood. 

The spider steps back, and Jim sees the crewman from before has returned, handing a coiled rope to Scroop. The boy jumps when a sharp crack slices through the muttering of the crowd. The low simmering fear crystallizes then, freezing him as he realizes it isn’t a rope Scroop is holding. The navy has never looked kindly upon corporal punishment, Jim knows, but then, this isn’t the navy. He shouldn’t feel surprised that the pirate crews are more ruthless. Eyeing the whip, he can see the long tail coiled like a snake across the deck. 

Silver is the last one on deck, and the crew’s eyes jump to him when he notices the scene and goes still. 

Jim is still staring at the whip, tense and thinking of all the horror stories he’s heard from spacers passing through the Benbow over the years. As his tunnel vision fades he eyes Scroop as well, and is surprised to not catch the toxic yellow eyes reveling in his terror. Despite being the apparent object of his aggression, Scroop isn’t looking at Jim. Instead his malicious grin is centered squarely on Silver, who is taking in the scene with a look of muted anger. 

Scroop cracks the whip again, almost lazily, and Jim flinches before he can stop himself. The sadistic grin from the spider says that he’s playing the part excellently, and Jim can’t stop himself from the anger that rolls off him for being so weak, for letting himself be used to hurt Silver. Because this isn’t about him, he knows that now. He’s the one tied to the mast, but this isn’t Scroop’s revenge on him. This is about Silver, about the crew putting their wavering Captain in his place, about forcing the man to choose between Jim or his crew.

“Well, Captain, now that you’ve led your lamb to slaughter, how would you like to proceed?” He sneers mock sweetly. 

Jim glances at Silver just in time to see the older man’s eyes change from staring at the boy to meeting Scroop’s challenge with a glare. He hates himself for wanting to see fear in his eyes, for hoping that he would drop the part already and tear the spider apart for daring to threaten Jim. 

“You’re not harming that boy.” He growls. 

“No?” Scroop looks intrigued. “And here I thought he meant nothing to you.” 

“He’s our best bet at the treasure, you kill him now, the map is useless.” Silver snarls, taking several steps until he’s standing toe to toe with Scroop, who rises on his legs to compensate for his height.

“The map is already useless, if it’s not with us.” He hisses back. 

“The map can be bartered for, and like it or not our best play right this moment is keeping him alive and healthy.” He stabs a finger at Jim. 

Scroop makes like he wants to retort, but then Silver is back in his face, snarling and posturing and deadly as he’s ever been. 

“If you hurt that boy before he can lead us to the treasure, I’ll see to it yer left on this planet to rot.” 

He gives one final snort and turns away, and Jim finally turns his aching neck from the confrontation. 

The snap crack of the whip sounding tenses him right back up, and he nearly pulls his shoulder out of it’s socket in his hurry to look.

The whip has been stopped midair, wrapped tightly around unaffected metal and the end coils tangled around Silver’s hand. Scroop is still holding the end, staring with challenge in his eyes up at his Captain, who looks nearly murderous. Scroop tries to pull on the weapon but Silver tears it from his grip before he can react, dragging the spider forward and wrapping his other hand around his skinny throat. Scroop scrambles for purchase for a half second before he’s thrown sideways across the deck, rolling several times before hitting the rail with a crash. 

Silver bares his teeth and roars, a deafening sound that cows the crew and makes them all look nervous to even be present for this confrontation. Jim feels a tiny bloom of hope, that Silver is protecting him from harm, but it’s squashed just as quickly. This is just another ploy, he’s just a means to the treasure. 

Jim sees the mutinous glare Scroop sends to his Captain before he’s preoccupied by Silver advancing on him. The restraints are untied roughly and the cabin boy struggles as Silver hoists him by the collar and half drags him into the nearest room. 

The lieutenant’s quarters are barebones, but Jim doesn’t have the time to give it thought as he’s shoved inside and the sound of the door locking echoes through the room. It’s spacious, and Jim stumbles a few steps before he regains his balance. He turns at the far wall, putting the bare skin of his back to it and staring uneasily at Silver. 

The comfort that comes with his proximity isn’t completely gone, thought Jim wishes it was. He watches Silver rub the bridge of his nose, and he’s so completely overwhelmed by the familiarity of the motion it almost makes the entire last hour feel like a strange nightmare.

Jim tenses when he sees the whip, coiled and still held loosely in Silver’s hand. 

The older man follows his gaze and sighs, looking at him sadly before throwing the whip to the floor in the corner of the room. He spreads his hands as if to say “unarmed”, but Jim doesn’t dare relax yet. Silver takes a tentative step towards him and Jim leans away from him. He looks so dismayed that Jim wants to run into his arms and be held, just let himself be comforted, but he can’t see past the anger and betrayal.

“I’m not gonna hurt ye, Jim.” He rasps.

Jim scoffs without intending to.

“You don’t expect me to believe that, do you?” He whispers back. Tears spring to his eyes and his throat closes against the urge to cry. 

Silver doesn’t flinch, but Jim knows he’s hurt by it. 

He takes another step, closing the gap between them inch by inch, and Jim doesn’t object, but he turns away and crosses his arms over his belly in a passive, closed off posture. A brush of a hand against his shoulder makes him jump, and he flattens himself to the wall with a noise like a struck dog. 

Silver pulls his hand back and Jim remains tensed. The silence reigns for a long moment of held breath, neither of them knows what to say.

“Don’t touch me.” Jim says through clenched teeth. He’s scared to death of Silver right now, he’s never revoked his consent like this, and he’s already unsure of where the older man’s limit is. He’s very aware of being in an enclosed space with a man who could easily overpower him.

The sadness in his eyes stings, but he takes a step back and allows Jim some space to breath. 

“You hurt?” He asks in a murmur. 

Jim shakes his head mutely, refusing to look at Silver. He is, he’s bruised and battered and will likely have all manner of colors marking him in the next few days, but he’ll survive, and more than that he’s not willing to take help from the older man right now. 

Silver sighs, and he sounds for the first time Jim has ever heard him, totally exhausted. The part of him that’s still pining yearns to touch him, but the hurt is still too powerful. Jim goes to fiddle with his shirt collar, only to nearly tear the thing off of himself with even the slightest motion. The rip down the back has left him bare skinned and vulnerable, and he wishes privately for the extra he keeps in his bag. 

He looks up at the feeling of eyes on him, and sees Silver staring at the shredded cloth. It’s funny, he’s never been shy about being naked in front of Silver before, but now he can barely stand to have his shirt off. 

“Can I have my other one to wear, or are you gonna make me walk around like this now?” Jim asks while indicating his ruined shirt, trying to keep his tone sharp instead of scared. 

Silver meets his eyes and looks so sad it almost makes Jim regret his words. 

“You’ll get to change before we leave.” He rasps, like it hurts him to speak.

A flicker of doubt enters Jim’s mind, the idea that Silver could have taken the map at any time last night and Jim wouldn’t have been able to stop him, but he shakes the thought away. He can’t think about that. Because if he thinks for even a second that Silver could have meant it when he said he loves him, then he’ll forgive him, and Jim isn’t ready for that. 

The long moment of introspective silence is broken as one of the crewman shouts through the door for Silver. Jim is dragged along with him as they pass through the ship to the prepared longboat, stopping just long enough for Jim to change his shirt before heading down to the docking bay.

As soon as they leave the room Silver’s demeanor changes. He turns stony and stoic, pushing Jim more roughly and handling him like a disobedient puppy rather than a nearly grown adult. Jim tries to shrug him off and glares venomously when Silver holds fast. He doesn’t even look like he noticed the attempt at freedom, and the boy mutters a mutinous curse to himself. The crew are staring at them, and Jim struggles again just out of spite. They pass an open door on the way to the bay and Jim peers in to see Scroop cradling a bloody cloth to his face. The spider looks enraged, and Jim shudders with the lethal anger he can feel pouring off of him.


	2. Chapter 2

The trip down to the planet is uneventful. Silver gathers a handful of the crew to make the journey, the ones he trusts not to stab him in the back first chance they get. 

He drags Jim up to the front of the longboat with him, keeping the boy close and isolating him from the wandering eyes and hands of the crew. Jim glares, resentful and angry, and he can’t blame him for it. 

The other longboat has crashed, when they find it. The imperfect takeoff paired with an unknown engine malfunction has left it damaged, but in one piece, at least enough for the Captain and her accomplice to have survived the wreckage. Jim looks distressed by the sight, and Silver wants nothing more than to hold and comfort the boy, but he knows he’s lost that privilege. He settles for allowing Jim as much space as possible, under the circumstances.

He sends the crew to search for the Captain and the doctor, keeping one hand tangled in the collar of Jim’s shirt. It feels a bit too much like a leash for comfort, but if Jim runs there’s no guarantee the crew won’t shoot him just because they can. He’s not willing to take that risk, discomfort be damned. 

They find the Captain and the doctor holed up not far away, sequestered in what might have been a home, hundreds of years ago. There’s no second exit, at least none that the Captain can get out of. When she returns the crew’s fire he spies a bandaged side and her arm in a sling. The crash must have injured her, but she’s strong enough still to aim true and nearly take out one of the men surrounding the tiny hut. She stops firing as soon as she spots Jim, and Silver takes the opportunity to drag the boy up the hill with him to bargain. She has the map, there’s no question about that. Jim went to great lengths to make the crew think he was the holder so that the Captain could escape, he wouldn’t have done that if they weren’t in possession of the one thing they all want. 

Out of the corner of his eye Silver spots the faint look of hope on Jim’s face. The prayer that maybe the Captain can barter for all their freedom, and Silver can’t help but admire the optimism that Jim hides so well behind sullen rebellion and snarky comments. The pang of hurt that comes next is deserved, knowing that he’s forever destroyed whatever trust the boy might have had in him. It still stings, but with it comes the thought once again that Jim deserves better, and the melancholy hope that someday, he might find it.

The Captain is wary, climbing out from the relative shelter of the structure, but the resolve in her eyes to get Jim out of this alive is clear even from a distance. She’s stoic, battered from the rough landing but steadfast. She cuts her eyes to Jim and gives a cursory scan of his frame, then her gaze switches to Silver, and the cold hostility in the sharp green of her eyes would be enough to kill a lesser man. For better or worse, Silver remains unaffected. 

“He’s unharmed?” She says, standing up to her full height.

Jim snorts bitterly and Silver squeezes his arm warningly. He has to handle this carefully, if he’s too hostile she might take the negotiations as a lost cause, but if he’s overly friendly she’ll underestimate the threat of the crew, and that is more dangerous than anything else. 

“He’s alive, isn't he?” Silver says back in a cool, neutral tone. 

A harsh exhale flares her nostrils, and the barely checked anger flashes in her eyes before her impeccable composure reasserts itself. 

“You’ll be wanting the map, I suspect?” Amelia spits. 

“Aye.” 

“And what happens if we don’t have it?” She challenges. Her voice is even, to anyone else it would’ve been an excellent bluff, but Silver has played this game since he was little more than a child.

He breathes out a sigh, frustration at the Captain and her damn pride both. He’s half tempted to tell her, to let them both in on his desire to turn on the rest of the crew, but they’re unlikely to believe him at best, and at worst it could mean a second mutiny, with Silver on the wrong side and Jim even more at risk. The only way she’ll hand the map over is if she thinks Jim is due for a fate worse than death without it. She needs to believe that the boy is in danger, and if she thinks of him as an ally then she might stand her ground, and Jim will be lucky to die before nightfall. It might give the lad some awkward questions to answer later, but as long as he’s alive to do so Silver can live with it.

He thumbs the back of Jim’s neck and tugs his hair, pulling his head back to reveal the fresh bruises from the night before littering his neck. The moment the Captain notices is visible on her face. In a heartbeat her eyes dilate and widen in horror and her lips press together into a thin line. He releases the boy and in his peripheral vision the lads head drops, a wave of shame rolling off his scent as he looks away. Her eyes dart between the two of them, and he knows by the look on her face that she’s rethinking every interaction they’ve ever had. She put Jim in his position on the ship, and for all her bravery she’s too noble and self sacrificing to let an innocent she’s responsible for get hurt.

She’s still and silent with fury for a moment, and then she opens her mouth and speaks with more anger and emotion than Silver has ever heard from her.

“I need your word, as Captain, that neither of them will come to any further harm, should we surrender.” She seethes. Behind her he can see the doctor, half hidden inside the structure and peering worriedly out at her.

Silver nods. He’d give her and the doctor both up in a heartbeat if it meant Jim gets to live, but he suspects she'd understand that. 

The Captain tilts her chin up defiantly, proud even in surrender, and seems to physically swallow her pride. She turns to the doctor and the pained look on her face is all too easy to read. She pulls the map from inside her sling, and even from this distance he can see the way her claws leave tiny pinprick scratches on the soft metal.

He doesn’t even have to signal the crew. As soon as he’s taken the map from her they’re moving up the hill, capturing the Captain and the doctor and a mossy, half rusted android that’s clearly experienced years of disrepair.

Amelia sends him a withering glare as she’s carted past, and one of the crew moves as if to tie Jim up as well, but Silver brushes him off. He’s not leaving Jim alone until this is over. If he’s with the crew he’ll be in enough danger as it is, if he’s with Amelia and the doctor they’re likely to try and escape, and then there’s no telling what the men will do in retaliation.

Once they have the treasure, once the crew is happy he’ll slip up and let the boy work out a plan. He’s clever, and between the three of them they can get away. But if he’s caught now Silver isn’t confident in his ability to control the crew’s anger, and he refuses to let Jim get hurt more than he already has.

* * *

The soft, ambient light from the sky is fading as Jim stands beside Silver. 

Half of the crew have split off, heading back to the Legacy for supplies. The rest are preparing for a night of rest before they set off at first light, something Jim is thankful for and dreading by turns. Amelia and Doppler are bound and sitting back to back on the ground nearby, and Jim wonders at first why Silver doesn’t do the same to him, then decides he doesn’t care.

He glares at Silver, who still has a hand around his bicep, keeping him close and tethered.

The time creeps by slowly, Silver directing the pirates and Jim occasionally feeling eyes on him and turning to meet the older man’s stare with a challenge, only to go unacknowledged. It’s maddening, and it’s nearly dark by the time Jim is startled by a hand gripping his collar and using it to steer him away from the makeshift campsite. Jim steals a glance behind him as he goes, seeing Amelia looking worriedly after him before his view is blocked. 

He’s sweating despite the cold as Silver guides him into the foliage. The light from the fire fades, and as they walk out of earshot Jim hears the crew whispering and snickering among themselves. The hand on his shoulder that would’ve once been comforting feels like a lead weight as the two of them go deeper still into the trees. Jim chances a glance at Silver, but the older man isn’t looking at him. His eyes are flicking around, searching their surroundings for something Jim can’t see. 

Jim tenses as Silver guides him against a trunk. He’s close, all of the sudden, a hand still on the younger man’s shoulder and the other tipping his head back to let their eyes meet.

Jim squirms out of his grip, pulling away and refusing to look at Silver’s face. 

And he feels the way Silver recoils, hesitating and pulling away from him. He tamps down the ache in his chest and glares daggers out into the darkness, holding desperately to the seething rage of being lied to. 

“Jimbo…” Silver starts, and the rage finally boils over.

“No! Don’t you fucking dare apologise.” Jim grinds out between his teeth. Despite the power imbalance between them Jim shakes off the hand on his shoulder and stretches up to his full height, still far shorter than Silver but enough to make a difference. 

“Jim-”

“I said stop!” He shouts, his suddenly raised voice loud in the silent clearing. Silver looks briefly back in the direction they came, and Jim follows his gaze long enough to be sure nobody overheard.

“Lad-” Silver tries again.

“You couldn’t have told me?” Jim asks. His voice is low in the wake of his outburst and he sounds pitiful, meek and helpless and so much like the kid crying for his dad to come back. He clears his throat to try and combat it. Silver looks taken aback. His ear flattens back to his head, a gesture Jim knows means regret.

“I wanted to, Jim. You don’t know how much it hurt to keep you in the dark.” 

“But you did keep me in the dark. _Fuck,_ did you even try to tell me?” Jim is getting angry again, the overwhelming urge to hit something starting to feel justified.

“Was trying to keep you safe.” Silver says, and he sounds desperate. “If they knew I told you anything we’d both be dead.” He gestures in the vague direction of the campsite.

“Like that’s better than where I’m at right now?” Jim snaps, deliberately avoiding the “we” in that sentence.

Silver’s eyes flash with a hint of anger, but Jim doesn’t back down. The adrenaline is pounding in his system, and he’s too upset to let it go yet.

“In one piece? I’d say that’s better, aye.” 

“I’m a hostage, _your_ fucking hostage.” Jim yells, indignant. 

Silver looks at him, anger and fear warring on his face, and when he steps toward Jim again the younger man doesn’t step back.

“D’ya know what they’d do to you, Jim? If I weren’t here?” Desperation flashes over his expression again, and a far off pain that means he’s seeing something Jim isn’t. “I’ll die rather than let that happen to ye.”

“How fucking noble of you.” He spits back.

“For once, lad, would you just listen?” 

“They want to fucking kill me, I get it!” Jim shouts. “You’re a real fucking savior for stopping them!” 

Silver goes quiet, and Jim briefly regrets his words because then the older man is grabbing his arms and pinning him against the trunk again, closer than they’ve been since Jim left his cabin this morning and such genuine anguish in his eyes it makes the younger man pause.

“You know what crews like that do to their cabin boys?” He hisses. 

“They take turns.” He says in too even a tone, and Jim suspected some covetous feelings before, but the way Silver says it forms a stone of dread in his stomach. 

The older man clears his throat before speaking again, and his voice is wrecked with emotion, with fear. 

“They’ll get you alone and they’ll use you, one after the other and without stopping, until you’re dead or too weak to fight back, and then they’ll use you some more, and if you’re lucky they’ll slit your throat to keep you quiet.” Silver rasps.

Jim doesn’t want to breathe. The imagery is too unnerving to process, and for the first time in hours his anger is replaced with horror. 

“They don’t want to kill you, Jim.” He says softly. “And that’s what I’m ‘fraid of. Only reason they haven’t tried a’ready is because I staked a claim, but that patience is runnin’ out.” 

A long moment of silence reigns between them. Jim doesn’t have the strength to push Silver away from him. 

“Why didn’t you let them have me?” He asks in a shaky voice, unsure if he wants to hear the answer. His eyes that have been locked with Silver’s this whole time flit around his face, searching for a sign, for something to indicate whether this is truth or lies. Silver releases Jim’s arm to touch his cheek and the younger man isn’t strong enough to push him away. 

A sad smile twists Silver’s mouth. 

“Because you’re so strong, Jim. So bright and alive an’ I knew they’d take everything that I love about you, and I’m too selfish to let them have you.”

His heart feels like it mends, then, like the broken pieces stitch back together and he’s on the verge of crying. It just makes it all the more painful when he realises that Silver is lying to him again. He’s using the words Jim wants to hear more than anything to blind him to the deceit, and anger curls in his stomach as tears well up in his eyes. 

“You fucking _liar_.” He growls, tearing out of Silver’s grip and pretending not to see the hurt in his eyes. 

“Jim-” Silver calls for him, walking after the younger man but stopping when he turns on his heel and snarls back.

“Trying to keep me safe?” He’s sniffling and fighting back the tears, without success. The anger and bitterness is clear in his voice. “What a fucking _joke_. You just wanted to keep me for yourself.”

Silver looks like he wants to argue, but Jim cuts him off.

“If you ever cared about me you’d have told me what I was getting into from the start!” That’s not fair and he knows it, but he’s too hurt and angry to care about such trivial things as logic when he’s arguing with the man he thought he could trust.

“I couldn’t’ve kept you safe if you’d known.” Silver tries, and he’s speaking softly and comforting, and Jim wants nothing more than to go back to this morning when he had no idea what was coming.

“That’s not the point! You lied to my fucking _face_!” He shouts. “You said that you…” Abruptly the energy floods from his body like water out of a broken dam, leaving him exhausted and on the brink of tears. 

“And I believed it.” Jim finishes miserably.

Silver reaches for him again and this time Jim simply steps back out of his reach. Not skittish or frightened, just exhausted. 

“Nothing you can say will make this better.” He says, voice sounding just as dead as he feels.

Finally Silver stops in his tracks and seems to take in what Jim is saying. There’s pain in his eyes and even, if Jim wanted to look closer, regret, but he’s not ready for that yet, and instead he stares out into the darkness. The self loathing reappears. Jim wishes again that he’d never followed Silver that night, that maybe he could have saved himself some heartache if he’d just thought with his head for once instead of letting his stupid impulses guide him.

“I don’t ever want to see you again.” Jim rasps, and he tries to ignore the slight flinch he catches in the corner of his vision. 

The walk back to the campsite is silent, and Jim ignores the snickers of the crew as they step back into the light of the fire. He’s sure they’re trying to see if his knees are dirty, or if his clothes are in disarray, but he’s too numb to care. Silver steers him to a clear spot and sits, keeping Jim near as he settles down to sleep. The ground is hard and cold, but even the threat of chill isn’t enough to make Jim get closer to Silver than absolutely necessary. 

The moss is cool and dry as he lays down his head, and Jim doesn’t expect to sleep, but he shuts his eyes anyway and lets his breathing slow. There’s no point in wasting his energy staying awake.

* * *

He comes to already moaning, with Silver licking into his mouth and running a hot palm down his chest.

The room is warm, a blanket loose around his hips and his slim frame pinned to the bed beneath the older man’s arm. The hand not teasing over his ribs threads through his hair and pulls him into the kiss, still gentle but with just a hint of roughness that Jim loves.

He feels safe in Silver’s arms. Any thoughts outside of how good it feels are hazy and half formed. He trusts the man completely, he’s happy to give in to the pleasure of touch. 

The hand in his hair slides down to massage at the nape of his neck, pulling his body more firmly against Silver in the process. The kiss finally breaks with a wet, slick sound and without skipping a beat the older man mouths down the side of Jim’s throat to bite at his shoulder.

It feels so good. His thoughts are foggy with desire and something harder to define, but it doesn’t matter. He’s safe and warm and happy, and the feeling of a knee nudging against his erection brings with it the promise of release before the night is out. 

“Ugh, Silver…” He moans. He feels sleepy, lazy and unusually sluggish, but a soft shushing into his ear soothes his worries. The hands are so familiar, he’s going to have the feeling of them branded on his skin for the rest of his life. 

The pressure on his cock increases, and with it comes a sudden clarity that something isn’t right. The details of the room are hard to make out, and even as he’s bucking into Silver’s touch everything feels more and more distant. 

Before he can even protest Jim is startling awake, the moss beneath his body tickling his cheek and hands where they rest on the ground.

The air is cool and damp, and Jim is breathing hard, his cheeks hot against the atmosphere. He’s hard in his pants, he realises, and his immediate thought is of the dream, of rolling over and curling up beside Silver to calm down, or ramp up the heat.

The memory of the last several hours hits, and Jim sucks in a breath like he’s just been hit in the gut. He can feel the presence of the rest of the crew resting around him, and Silver himself at his back. He grits his teeth, angry at himself and his body, at his first thought upon waking. Part of him is still tempted to try and curl against the older man, to close the yawning gap between their bodies and feel the warmth he knows if waiting for him, but the anger is too strong. 

He folds his arms around himself and tries to will away his erection, resigned to a long, sleepless night.


	3. Chapter 3

The crew begin to stir at first light, and Jim watches and tries not to shiver in the chill morning air. 

Silver wakes not long after, and Jim feels eyes on him and tries harder to repress his body’s objection to the cold. He’s left alone, and part of him wants to feel bitter about that, but he knows this is what he wanted, and doesn’t put the energy into anger. He’s exhausted, both from the fitful rest and the events of the day before. 

It isn’t long before he’s herded upright and dragged to the center of the gathered crew. 

Jim sends Silver a mutinous glare as the map is shoved into his hands. The light is clear and bright, and the longboat has been readied for a journey, Amelia, Doppler and the android already inside. He’s tempted to refuse to open the thing, but at this point it’s just delaying the inevitable, and he’s so tired.

The crew gasp as one as the green light floods out, but Jim just stares at Silver with such betrayal in his eyes he knows the older man can feel his hurt. He knows they’re both thinking of the night before, and he hates that he can tell when they’re in sync even after everything. Then all of them are boarding the longboat and following the path set out for them, Silver at the front with Jim leaning away from him as much as possible. 

It takes all morning, and the better part of what Jim assumes is the afternoon, before the gentle pulsing of the light starts to speed up as the foliage gets thicker and taller and harder to navigate. Just within eyesight he can see the Legacy, trailing them like a great shark after a minnow. The tracker on the skiff is blinking intermittently, and he wonders idly what would happen if he tried to steal it and escape while the rest of the pirates are preoccupied. 

They finally can’t go any further, and Jim follows Silver out of the longboat without needing to be prompted when it stops, which rankles and is enough to make him hold his ground when the older man jerks his head to get the boy to move towards the fronds blocking their view. Not far behind the Legacy is closing in on their location, and Jim hears the telltale clanking of B.E.N. being pushed to follow the rest of the pack. A hand tangling roughly in the front of his shirt is just insult to injury, and he’s so busy fighting spitefully against the hold that it takes him a moment too long to notice when all the other crew stop dead in their tracks. 

The ground just… ends. A sheer cliff face over a huge windswept plain. The air is buffeting around them and Jim shudders at the sudden change from forest canopy to open air. He feels exposed, and as he’s looking over the vast canyon the map still in his hand makes a noise like it’s sucking air into itself, and the guideline that they’d been following vanishes. 

“What’s going on, Jimbo?” Silver growls from not far away. Jim tries to open the map, perplexed at the sudden denial.

“I don’t know.” He shoots back. “I-I can’t get it open.” He tries to open it again, at first confused and then scared as the metal won’t budge. He tries to force it, hoping that something is just stuck, but his panic starts to take form as the angry shouts of the crew get louder and closer.

Something hits him in the back, hard enough that he falls, dangerously close to the cliff edge and only barely keeping ahold of the map. He yelps, fear rising as the crew aren’t satiated by his fall. The shouting is rising to a cacophony as he spots the indent in the otherwise smooth metal below him, and he brushes away the moss quickly, spotting the telltale markings of the map in negative. The crew are advancing on him, and as the shadows close over his head he manages to shove the sphere into place with a tremendous click that resonates across the valley. 

At first he’s terrified that nothing has happened, but then points of light are shooting across the ground and converging on them, and Jim is scrambling back in awe and fear both as the light spirals up into the sky by a hundred meters or more. 

The map forms itself into a navigation console, a miniature of what it had been the first time he opened it. The entirety of the galaxy compressed into a space small enough to be held in his arms. He touches one of the planet shaped objects within the map, curious, and the light that had been a single vertical until that point widens itself to a three pointed shape, showing like a window into the galaxy. 

He’s not sure what he’s looking at, at first. The world behind the window has vanished, like the blinds his mother would use at the Benbow during those rare violent storms. And then something familiar, a nebula he’s seen in one of his textbooks appears through the triangular space, and he gasps. Jim takes a step forward without meaning to, enraptured by the color and the scale and the slow motion of the nebula as it sways as if in a breeze.

It’s a portal. He’s standing in front of a door that could lead him anywhere in the galaxy. For a moment the heartbreak and fear of the past few days is lost to the sheer awe of this place. 

On a hunch, he touches his finger to the tiny sphere on the outskirts of the map, crossed by two rings of debris and something he’s seen a hundred times through the map and in his childhood bedroom. The nebula he’d been gazing at vanishes, replaced by a warm yellow light and a metal plated cavern unlike anything he’s ever seen, perhaps excluding the map itself. 

He steps inside, a gusty breath escaping as he takes in everything with disbelieving eyes. He doesn’t even register Silver’s hand on his shoulder until he’s walking by Jim, equally awed and stunned to silence. 

The crew rush past him into the room, and Jim’s previously wondrous expression shutters as he steps back from the rush of bodies. 

Down the sloping ramp he spots a ship, battered and decrepit, but maybe not so rotted as to be nonfunctional. He slinks away quietly, though it’s clear his escape is the farthest thing from the pirates minds at this point. Even the clattering of the android following after him isn’t enough to draw their attention.

Clambering onto the ship he jumps at the sight of a body, bones and pieces of mummified flesh that's been waiting here for who knows how long. The structure is familiar, he recognises the skeletal remains as the face he’d seen in his story books. The robot confirms it, though unnecessarily, and Jim ignores him as he continues talking like the boy is listening.

Flint looks almost small like this. He’d always assumed the man must have been larger than life, strong and deadly, but in reality he can’t have been much taller than Jim was. The thought that they’ve walked into a tomb rushes through his mind, and he shivers uneasily, imagining he can feel malice and cruel intent from the desiccated corpse. 

The ship itself is loaded down by treasure, but Jim spots something locked in the deathgrip of the skeleton’s hand, even as the android is droning on in the background. The thing is unaffected by the maybe hundreds of years of rot, and at first his interest is purely in why Flint would have held this so close as he was dying. 

The bones snap off when he grabs it, and comparing the shape to B.E.N.’s dome leaves him with little question of what this is. The memory circuit springs into place without any effort, and the sound of the robot rebooting itself in less than a heartbeat startles them both. 

And then the explosions start, raining metal spires and plates down around the core like stalactites during an earthquake.

“ _It’s not just a tomb,_ ” Jim thinks in horror, “ _it’s a trap._ ” Flint was so determined to keep his treasure that he was willing to destroy it all to keep any would be treasure hunters from stealing it, even long after his death. 

“Go back and help the Captain and doc.” Jim yells as he bolts for the console and tears the panel hiding the wiring off. “If I’m not there in five minutes, leave without me!”

Any objections B.E.N. might have had vanish as Jim scoops the poor frightened Morph from his pocket and chucks him at the robot, his shouting to leave muffled as he slides under the console again. The explosions serve as enough background noise that Jim can’t hear when or even if B.E.N. departs, but he’s left alone and that is evidence enough that he’s alone on the ship.

He’s done this enough that it should be easy, but apparently the tech has undergone some serious changes in the past century, because he’s never had more trouble hotwiring a vehicle. The ship shudders with another explosion and Jim grits his teeth, willing the damn thing to just work already and starting to sweat with the stress and the sudden heat filling the planet’s core.

“Ah, Jimbo.” The words carry over the cacophony with painful clarity.

Jim freezes. He isn’t even sure how to react anymore. Part of him wants to be relieved that Silver is okay. Another part is still scared, and not willing to trust anyone again, much less the man that betrayed him. 

He scrambles out from under the controls, backing up against it and startling at how close Silver has gotten in the time it took to stand up. Just days ago he could barely stand to have a foot of distance between them, now even a few meters feels much too close. The older man is still approaching, and Jim forces himself to move. To do something, anything. 

‘Anything’ ends up being a rusted blade between them. 

“Get back.” Jim says with confidence he doesn’t feel. He’s scared to death and the look on Silver’s face says that it’s obvious. His hands are shaking, the weapon steady only by virtue of its weight and he’s backed up against the helm like a cornered stray.

Despite the threat, despite Jim’s anger, despite _everything_ , Silver doesn’t look angry. He looks at Jim with sadness and regret, and it’s enough for the young man to let the tip of the blade fall just slightly as he steps closer. He’s crying, tears falling steady and silent as Silver finally steps within arm’s reach of him. The sword is taken gently from his hands, dropped with a clatter that Jim only barely hears because Silver is standing in front of him, hesitant but so clearly apologetic, and he doesn’t want to hate him anymore. 

A sob rips out of his lungs when the older man’s hand brushes his shoulder. He’s weak, he’s so fucking weak that he can’t even bring himself to stay angry at the man who sold them all out. 

“I know, lad.” He says, moving his hand to cup the younger man’s cheek and thumb away his tears. “Haven’t done right by you, but right now we need to get you somewhere safe.” 

Jim cries harder, smiling at a nuzzle to his hairline. He’s so fucking in love it feels like he can’t even breathe by himself anymore, and he wouldn’t have it any other way.

“How sweet.” 

The hiss is dripping venom, and Jim wishes he still had his weapon even as Silver is turning to face Scroop where he stands on the deck. Their position places Jim already behind the older man, but the deliberate step between them he takes when Scroop eyes Jim makes his heart swell. A low growl echoes from Silver’s bared teeth, and Jim recalls with some optimism how easily the older man had tossed the spider around the room just a day ago. 

“I knew you’d gone soft. The crew might’ve been fooled, but I wasn’t.” Scroop moves towards them, his advancing urging Silver to push Jim further behind himself. 

“You won’t touch that boy.” He snarls, showing canines and standing tall enough to loom over Scroop even from a distance. 

Silver anticipates the spider’s strike a moment before it happens. He shoves Jim away and meets his slash with the forearm of his metal hand, allowing the blow to glance harmlessly off the surface with a ringing clang. 

Jim scrambles to his feet and backs away, giving space to the pair trading blows. 

Silver draws a blade and delivers a slash that would have gashed open the spider’s chest, had he not dodged with unmatched speed and agility. He parries another strike and manages to grab Scroop’s claw long enough to drag him close and slice at the exoskeleton. Jim hopes, at first, but he’s disappointed as the spider skitters back with no damage to his chitinous shell. 

The distance between the fighters gives Silver a moment, and he turns to Jim with such trust and surety in his eyes it give the younger man strength. 

“Get the ship going!” He shouts over the still ongoing explosions. “I’ll take care of this.” He growls, turning back to Scroop. 

The spider hisses a laugh as Silver sheathes the ineffective sword. Jim scrambles to get to work, looking over his shoulder every other second to make sure the duel is playing out in his favor. 

“You’ve been getting weaker, _Captain_.” Scroop hisses, sarcasm and mockery lilting his voice. “Can’t even keep your little toy from causing trouble. It’s such a shame he has to die, I’ll bet the crew would love to keep him warm for you.” 

Silver snarls, blocking Scroop as he tries to sidle towards Jim. The distance between them is decreasing by the moment, Scroop stepping forward and Silver refusing to leave Jim vulnerable or any closer to the brawl than he already is.

The next strike hits with a crunch of metal on shell, and Scroop yells in pain but answers by locking his claws around the wrist of the hand and catching the other that comes to tear at his eyes and face. 

The two of them fall into a stalemate, locked in a position neither is willing to break from but where neither can gain the upper hand. 

Scroop leans in, eyes glowing with rage and fangs nearly within striking distance of his former Captain, but his eyes are fixed on Jim over Silver’s shoulder.

“Don’t worry,” Scroop hisses with malicious glee. “I’ll make sure you get to watch your cabin boy die.”

Silver jerks back just in time to avoid the fangs that lunge to pierce his shoulder. The hold broken, Scroop now has free reign to slash and claw at the unarmored side of him, managing a few shallow grazes with his claws that draw blood but don’t cut deep enough to seriously injure. 

Jim tears his eyes away and fights to keep his concentration. The ship refuses to cooperate, denying any and all his attempts at taking control, and he’s almost too caught up in his work to notice as the brawl moves close enough to put him in the line of fire. 

A claw comes down on the console, hard enough to make Jim jump and send a few sparks from the controls. He leaps away, panicked as Scroop makes a grab for him, but he’s pulled up short by a hand that catches him around the throat and drags him back out of reach.

Silver throws Scroop across the tilting deck, putting himself between the momentarily stunned spider and his boy. It isn’t long before Scroop is on his feet again though, rushing at his Captain and hissing, slashing claws and fangs dripping venom. Jim tries to work as fast as he can, but rewiring the ship would’ve taken a while even with all his concentration. As it is, he can barely keep from looking away from the battle, terrified that any second he’s going to see the slash of a claw and the arterial spray that means Silver has lost.

A wet sound of rending flesh and a shout of pain, and Jim looks up in time to see Silver blinded and bloodied, and Scroop advancing towards him with a look of pure deadly intent. 

One of the claws wrap around his ankle before he can pull himself into a defensive position, and Jim kicks like a wild animal but he’s pulled away from the console with so little effort it’s pathetic. Scroop hisses at him, glee and monstrous malice clear in those sickly yellow eyes. 

Jim hits the deck with a grunt and Scroop makes a similar noise of surprise, turning to catch a blow to the throat that sends him tumbling across the deck. Jim scrambles upright, shaking as he looks up and sees Silver wiping the blood from his vision. 

Their eyes lock. Jim watches the fear and stress turn to calculation as the older man stares at the sparking controls, then it crystalizes into resignation. 

His flesh hand is warm where it grabs Jim’s shoulder, and he places his own over it reflexively before he’s looking back at Silver where he’s leaned down to speak urgently to the younger man.

“It’s time for you to run now, Jim.” 

Jim gawks at him for a second, then he musters the anger he had this morning and directs it into the determination in his words.

“No, I’m not leaving you.” He’s going to stay with Silver it it ends up killing him. He flicks his eyes to Scroop and sees with dismay that he’s already picking himself back up. The likelihood of this becoming his grave is increasing by the second, but he’s not leaving without Silver.

“Jim.” Silver says, and he sounds desperate. They don’t have time for an argument.

He isn’t ready for the moment to break, and he’s startled when Silver shoves him away roughly, only breaking eye contact at the last possible second before turning to the spider, now back on his feet and rushing at the pair with a screech. 

Jim catches Scroop’s eyes in the midst of the battle, and the spider eyes the cabin boy with such hatred it makes him seriously consider running. The ship is a lost cause. Maybe if he had more time, or fewer distractions, but the time sunk isn’t worth it. 

Instead he grabs the hilt of a blade from within the tattered remains of Flint’s clothes and pulls, making a noise of frustration when a short knife is all he gets for his trouble. If he still had the sword from earlier perhaps, but with the explosions rocking the ship most of the treasure has already fallen overboard, and he doesn’t have time to search for an alternative. The fight is ongoing, and Jim is alarmed to find the two of them more or less evenly matched. Silver is strong and deadly as anything, but Scroop is faster and harder to get a hold of, and has a natural armor besides. 

It isn’t even a misstep that causes it. Silver is perfectly capable, but he’s bipedal and has poor enough balance aside, so when the ship is rocked by another explosion he needs a moment to regain his balance, one Scroop does not give. The spider, much better equipped with his many chitinous legs, skitters up and delivers a swipe that sends a spatter of blood across the deck. Silver manages to get an arm up to block the blow aimed for the jugular, but the damage is done, and he falls to his back with Scroop right on top of him. 

The scuffle begins to go south and Jim can only watch as the knock down drag out fight turns into a tight, tense battle of wills. Scroop lunges again and manages to graze flesh with his fangs, and Silver jerks his forearm away before the venom can hit, but that reflex is enough for the spider to get his claws around his arm and pin it, the other metal one coming to grip Scroop by the throat. 

He draws his free claw back, clearly aiming a slash across the older man’s jugular, and Jim can’t stay still anymore. 

He runs towards the two, hoping Scroop has forgotten about him long enough for his strike to be a surprise. He slashes at the spider, aiming for the back of his legs but happy to hit anything at this point. As long as he can distract him, get Scroop away from Silver long enough for him to recover. The slash is redirected and hits nothing but open air. Jim gasps at the feeling of a razor sharp claw closing around his weapon hand, but then Scroop is pulling him forward at the same time as he’s bringing his other claw in a wide arc. 

The blow hits with a familiar crack, and Jim shouts as he’s sent sprawling. The knife scatters across the deck, far away and out of sight, and Jim looks up through what feels like a cracked orbital socket to watch the grinning spider advance on him. 

“Poor cabin boy.” He coos, brandishing his claw like the blade Jim had failed so miserably to wield. 

Jim crawls backwards, trying futilely to keep distance between himself and the spider. His leg is trapped against the ground by a claw, and Jim screams as the razor sharp pins lining the inside saw through his pants and dig into his flesh. Scroop pushes his free claw against Jim’s belly, digging it in slowly and reveling in the fear in Jim’s eyes. He’s about to be gutted, to have his insides spilled like so much butcher meat, and any attempts at freedom will only bleed him out more quickly. 

Scroop hits the deck with a grunt, and Jim tries to get up past the pain his in leg but he collapses back to the deck immediately. All he can do is watch, blood dripping from a split above his eye as Silver drags Scroop back to him and tries again to overpower him despite being injured and exhausted from fighting. 

The next explosion is closer, close enough to send the already tilting ship juddering and slam it into one of the few remaining pillars above what is now a lake of molten metal. Jim doesn’t even have time to register the sound before he’s falling, the breath driven out of him as the railing slams into his ribcage, and then he’s sliding over and slipping down a sheer metal cliff, towards a canyon that leads down into the core of the planet and is hotter with every inch he falls.

He tries to catch himself, clawing at the metal in hopes of finding a seam, a rivet, something, _anything_. His legs slide over, and just in time Jim feels the lip he’s sliding off and digs his elbows in to hold on. 

The momentum slows, but he knows just by looking that trying to get back up isn’t likely. Already his legs are getting heavy, and every tiny swing that gravity forces makes him slip another centimeter. 

Silver shouts something, and Jim only barely hears it over the din of the explosions, but he feels the desperation in it and he knows. Looking up he sees first Scroop, grinning and twisting the metal arm in his claws until even the rugged material is threatening to break. Silver is pinned, fighting against Scroop with everything but every now and then sending increasingly desperate looks at Jim as he’s taken more and more by the cold grip of gravity.

The heat from below is overwhelming, and Jim wants to look but at the same time he doesn’t dare compromise his balance by even turning his head. Instead he’s forced to stare in complete terror as his muscles begin to scream, watching Silver try and fight off the spider.

After a long scuffle everything goes still, and now Jim is staring with resignation. Silver can’t save him, and he knows sooner or later he’s going to fall. It’s just matter of time, now, and he wants to use every last breath to fight even if he knows it’s not going to be enough.

Another explosion goes off, this one near enough for them all to look up, startled. Before Scroop can remember his priority Silver has taken the opportunity, and Jim wants to cheer as he bucks the spider off and turns, slamming his skull into the console with such brutality it’s clear there’s no recovering. The body goes limp and falls, but Jim sees those evil yellow eyes open once more on the way down, and before he can react Scroop is following the same path Jim had just moments ago, uncontrolled and way too close for comfort. 

Silver yells, and Jim tries to distance himself, but Scroop manages to clip him on the way down. The claw that tangles in his shirt doesn’t manage to hold on, as soon as gravity has the six foot arthropod he’s falling with a raspy scream, but Jim is yanked backwards before he can stop himself, and yelps in terror as he’s suddenly hanging by just his fingers. 

The sound of something hitting the molten core below makes him wince, if only for the sheer amount of time it took for Scroop to drop. Jim grunts with the effort of trying to pull himself up, shouting and clawing at the smooth metal. 

He’s crying, there are tears in his eyes, because he’s never been so scared of dying before. He tries again, not ready to give up and praying like he’s never prayed before. _Please, please I’m not ready, not yet._

His fingers are shaking, and the sweat that had already collected on his palms is making his grip worse. He can count on his fingers the amount of time he has left, and the prospect of death is more real than it’s ever been. 

He gasps when something changes. Everything in him had been ready for his hands to give out and to drop, so the sudden stimulus of a cool, strong hand wrapping around his forearm makes Jim cry out and close his eyes against his own impending doom. The sensation of being pulled up, first by his arm then by an additional hand gripping the collar of his shirt is what brings him back. As soon as he catches on Jim is scrambling to climb back onto the slanted platform, holding Silver’s hand right back and refusing to release his grip. 

The climb up the platform is nerve wracking, but they make it well enough and Jim takes one look down the slope that had almost been the death of him before turning to Silver with shaking hands and pounding adrenaline. Their left and right hand respectively are still joined, and Jim doesn’t let go even as he throws himself into a desperate, terrified, relieved embrace. The position squashes their hands between them in an awkward, uncomfortable way, and Silver only has the one free hand to hold Jim against him, but it’s enough and it’s safety, and Jim honestly thought he’d never feel that again. 

“Y-you gave up t-the…?” He doesn’t even know why he’s asking. Maybe he just needs to hear it, to know it was real.

Silver doesn’t answer, he doesn’t need to. He presses their foreheads together, cradling the back of Jim’s head in his free hand and his grip tight enough that Jim knows he never wants to let go again. 

The portal isn’t far away, and the path to it is thankfully intact enough for the two of them to make it. They burst out onto the platform, panting and Jim with a painfully wide smile on his face. Despite the places he’s injured stinging and aching, he’s too invigorated by the fact that he’s somehow alive to care about the minor injuries he sustained. 

The Legacy’s engines whine as it pulls up alongside the cliff, and Jim is greeted by an ecstatic Morph as he climbs aboard, looking back to see Silver right behind him. They both look like hell, covered in blood and sweat and clothes torn, and the twin looks of shock on Amelia and Doppler’s faces says as much, but he doesn’t care. He’s alive, they’re both alive. The injuries will heal, the scars will fade, they survived.

The urge to grab Silver’s hand as he races across the deck is overpowering, but the imperious scowl on the Captain’s face when they approach is enough to make him think better of it. Her sharp words cutting off the older man’s veiled appeal is disheartening, but Jim doesn’t have time to think about it, because then something is crashing into the main sail and he’s preoccupied as Silver’s arm crosses his chest in a protective gesture. 

The ship struggles and shudders and Jim grips the rail next to him hard enough that his fingers ache. 

“Mizzen sails, immobilized, Captain!” Jim hears. “Thrusters at thirty percent capacity!” 

“Thirty percent, th-that means we’ll-” Doppler answers, horror in his tone. “We’ll never clear the planet's explosion in time.” 

Jim turns around and looks back at where they came from, judging the distance between the ship and the portal. He knows it’s a longshot, that they’re all as good as dead if he’s wrong, but one look at Silver and he’s leaping down the stairs toward the ruined debris of the mast.

* * *

Silver doesn't even have time to internalize the danger before he’s distracted.

“We gotta turn around.” Jim mutters, just loud enough to be heard over the din of the explosions below. 

“What?” Amelia shouts, but Jim is already moving away.

“There’s a portal back there!” He yells. “It can get us out of here!” 

Silver catches onto the boy’s idea, and a spike of dread shoots through his stomach even as he’s following Jim’s gaze back toward the portal. He’s right. Their best shot is back through, and he knows what Jim is planning even before he’s moving to help. When he locks eyes he knows there’s no dissuading the boy, and if he tries the pleas will fall on deaf ears. 

“What’dya need, Jim?” He asks instead. 

A grateful smile stretches the exhaustion lines around the lad’s face, and then he’s snapping back into concentration. 

“Some way to attach this.” He shoves at a thruster, rolling it onto a long, flattened bit of debris. 

He almost wishes the process takes longer than it does. Within moments Jim is poised on the ship’s railing, locked in place and ready to take off back the way they came with no guarantee of success. 

“Whatever happens,” He’s looking down at his feet as he speaks. “Keep the ship headed straight for that portal.”

Their gazes catch and Jim looks terrified. His hand is shaking where it’s braced on the board, but the determined set of his brow says everything. He’s not willing to give up. Silver nods and opens his mouth to plead with him one more time, to tell him to be safe, _something_ , but the boy tears his gaze away before he can speak and shoots off into the orange hued distance. He closes his eyes for a heartbeat and prays, fervently. Let the boy make it, even if the rest of them don’t. 

And then the moment is over, and he barely has to turn to the controls before the doctor is following Jim’s trajectory towards the fiery inferno. 

* * *

The relief that floods Jim's system as he feels the cool wind of the etherium on his face is unparalleled, even enough to mute the sound of a planet exploding behind the rush of blood pounding in his ears. 

The Legacy has caught up to him, and he barely manages to keep upright long enough to stumble onto the deck before he’s collapsing against the rail. His lungs feel sore from panting and screaming and probably inhaling a lot of smoke, and his legs give out as he leans fully into the siderail. He’s breathing hard, more adrenaline than blood and blinking at the unexpected feeling of tears in his eyes. His bones and muscles refuse to work, even as he’s staring at Silver across the deck and dying to throw himself into the other man’s arms. 

Amelia and Doppler are pleased, and Jim is so high on the sheer fact that he’s alive somehow that he’s even indulgent enough to allow the android some leeway. 

Somewhere among the commotion he notices that Morph has disappeared, and when he looks to the stairs for Silver finds him similarly gone. Amelia is still too relieved to have noticed, and Jim slinks down the stairs to the launch bay on a hunch. 

“You never quit, do you?” 

Silver looks startled when he notices Jim standing there, and gives a chagrined smile that Jim can’t help melting over. He opens his mouth and Jim knows a lie is coming, but then a shadow crosses his face and Silver lets out the breath he was holding. 

“I can’t stay, lad.” He says instead.

“I know.” Jim says back, through tears. “I wouldn’t ask you to.” 

He doesn’t know who moves first, and in the end it doesn’t matter. They meet in the middle, Jim wrapping his arms around Silver as hard as he can and the older man hugging him back just as strongly. The hitching breaths and shaking shoulders are enough to tell that neither of them wants this moment to end. 

Jim holds on as long as he can, burying his face in Silver’s shirt even as the older man relaxes his grip by a fraction. 

“Shh, it’s alright.” He murmurs, thumbing the back of Jim’s head as he cries in earnest. Jim doesn’t want to let him go, he wants to stay with him, to curl up on his lap and never leave, but his mother will kill him if he doesn’t come home, and he can’t abandon her without at least a goodbye. 

Instead he tangles both hands into the lapels of Silver’s jacket and kisses him hard, determined to make their last the best. 

Silver makes a noise that might be a whine, and then he’s kissing back with equal vigor, holding the back of Jim’s head in one hand and gripping his forearm with the other, hard enough that Jim knows he’ll have circular bruises on his skin in a few hours. 

The kiss finally tapers out and they part reluctantly. Jim’s eyes are still wet with tears and Silver isn’t much better, but he butts their heads together in one final gesture before he’s stepping back and putting some distance between them, like he knows if he doesn’t do it now it’ll never happen. 

“I’m gonna miss you.” Jim says in a watery mutter. “More than you can imagine.” 

Silver smiles back, the sort of look that says _“Try me.”_ But he doesn’t say it. 

Morph coos at Jim, rubbing on his cheek and getting a hiccoughing laugh for his trouble. 

“Yeah, I’m gonna miss you too, you little shit.” He scratches the shapeshifter under the chin, petting him mostly to draw out the goodbyes. 

Morph blubbers a goodbye and mopes back over to Silver’s shoulder, still more a puddle than a solid form. 

Jim watches as the older man takes the mimic in his hands and addresses him. 

“Morphy, I’ve got a job for ye.” He says, with a smile in Jim’s direction. 

“I need you to keep an eye on this pup.” He pushes Morph off his finger, gently, towards Jim who’s crying again. 

“Keep him out of trouble for me.” He says, ostensibly to Morph, but Jim laughs as their eyes meet over the shapeshifter's head. They both know who’ll be the responsible one between the two.

He rubs at his eyes with the heel of his hand as Morph coos a goodbye to Silver and shoots over to his shoulder instead. As much as he wishes he could stay with Silver, this small part of him will just have to do until he can find the older man again. 

And he is going to find him again, he knows. However long it takes, wherever he has to go to do it, he’s going to meet Silver again. 

The older man turns to him one last time, brushing his cheek and shaking his head sadly when Jim leans into it like it’s the last thing he’ll ever touch. 

“I’ll see you again, okay?” Jim asks, like he’s nervous of the answer. 

Silver leans in and nuzzles his hairline, and Jim lets out a shuddering sigh at the feeling. 

“Morphy knows how to find me.” He says, stepping into the skiff as it’s lowering to the open doors. 

“Oh, and one more thing.” Jim catches the handful of treasure thrown at him easily, surprised at how quickly he’d forgotten about the purpose of this whole journey. 

“That’s for your dear mother, to rebuild that inn of hers.” Silver calls, and Jim shakes his head as he’s laughing. It’s not funny, not really, but it feels like it’s been years since that night and even ages since this morning, when he would’ve been happy to never see Silver again. 

He fights down the lump in his throat and calls out, one final time. 

“Stay out of trouble, you ol’ scalawag.” His voice is rough with emotion, but Silver hears him clearly enough. 

“Why Jimbo, when have I ever done otherwise?” He jokes, and Jim laughs even as tears are falling down his face. 

He watches Silver shoot off into the distance. He knows the spaceport is nearby, just out of view, and that there are likely officers waiting to determine what happened. For now though, it’s quiet down in the cargo bay. He sits on the edge of the catwalk with Morph, watching the shape of the longboat grow indistinct among the starlight, and farther and farther away until it’s vanished entirely into the distance. 

He smiles despite the tears. He’ll see Silver again, someday. The rest of his future is a mystery, but that much he knows with absolute certainty.


	4. Epilogue

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Epilogue chapter! I bet nobody expected that! I sure didn't, anyway. 
> 
> This was mostly filler and an excuse to write angry Jim.
> 
> Also heads up: This chapter contains some characters discussing the ethics of underage sex. None of this is necessarily a reflection on my opinions on the matter, it is an exploration of how these characters would (in my opinion) react to the events of the series. Take everything here with a massive grain of salt and the understanding that this is a fictional setting containing fictional characters and, therefore, no consequences, and enjoy.

Sarah has been alone at Doppler's home for months now, fretting over not hearing anything and dreading any news by turns. They’re only halfway through the journey at most, by now. News about it means something has gone wrong, she reasons. 

So when a note shows up on the door addressed to her in Jim’s handwriting, her heart nearly stops right then. She tears it open, reassured by her son’s script on the outside. The letter is short and vague.

“ _ Mom,  _

_ Made it home safe earlier than expected. Currently stuck at port, and will be for a while. Promise I’ll tell you everything when I get home.  _

_ \- Jim _ ”

Sarah doesn’t wait for him to come home. Within the hour she’s boarding a shuttle to the spaceport, overnight bag packed and equal parts relieved and terrified. If he’s alright enough to send her a message then he clearly survived. On the other hand, the notion of the ship being detained at the port does not bode well.

The Legacy is in one piece, at least. It looks worse for wear and more than a little battered, but it appears to have made it to port under its own power. 

She races up the gangplank, all ladylike manners forgotten in the dash to see her boy.

The deck is deserted, and the signs are not encouraging. One of the masts has been decimated, snapped in half like so much kindling and laying across part of the deck. The sails are torn and the ship has sustained damage.

“Mom?” 

Sarah turns to see her boy, and at first she’s too glad to see him to even notice the state he’s in. 

She rushes over and hugs him, relieved that he’s okay. A hiss of pain makes her step back, and when she looks at Jim more critically he’s favoring one leg and his face is visibly bruised in several places. The split above his brow is the worst, but his cheek is yellowed with half healed damage and his neck has a mark like something was wrapped around it and squeezed. 

Her heart thuds loudly in her chest as Sarah is taken back in time to when her boy was seven years old. Her hands fly over him, hovering and patting at him like her fingertips can heal the damage wrought with their touch alone. Her terrified checking is stopped in it’s tracks, however, by the look on Jim’s face. 

For all the pain he’s clearly in, Jim looks happy. He’s smiling at her like he’s genuinely glad to see her, a look on his face like she hasn’t seen in years. He seems taller too, though as she eyes the lack of a slouch she knows it has nothing to do with late growth spurts. 

“What happened?” She asks, hand hovering above his bruised cheek nervously. 

His smile falls then, becoming just a bit pained and a lot more reluctant. 

The appearance of Doppler stumbling down the stairs from the Captain’s cabin is relief Sarah didn’t know she was hoping for. Seeing her oldest, dearest friend alive and somehow in better shape than Jim reassures her that the journey was not as bad as it could have been.

He reaches them and stutters out a hello, excitement at seeing her clearly warring with the same trepidation Jim is feeling. He keeps sending the teenager looks, like he’s not sure how much to say. Among all the commotion Sarah almost doesn’t notice the small pink blob that floats up to her until Jim is scooping it into his palm and petting it affectionately. 

“Morph, take it easy.” He chides the blob, who chirrups back cheerily.

“Mrs. Hawkins, I presume?” A haughty, feminine voice calls, silencing the group of them with effortless command.

Sarah turns to meet this new presence, nodding when she locks eyes with a slim feline who can only be the Captain. The woman that holds out her hand is tall and authoritative, something Jim probably found grating, she thinks with some unease. 

Her smile is thin and strained, but not facetious. 

“Captain Amelia.” She introduces herself. Sarah shakes her hand warily. 

“If you’d be so kind as to follow us, gentlemen, I believe there are some things we ought to discuss.” She says, ostensibly to both the men, but her eyes fixate on Jim and he stares back just as strongly. The feeling that there’s something they aren’t telling her arises, and Sarah walks into the Captain’s cabin with dread in her stomach. 

The state of the room doesn’t help. The windows along one side of the room are shattered, so completely as to have been unlikely that they were simply hit by mistake. The door of the room is in pieces, half melted and hanging on it’s hinges, and in a section of the floor there’s a makeshift trapdoor down into a lower portion of the ship.

Despite the mess, Amelia sits behind the desk as if none of the damage concerns her. Delbert stands by the door, looking as if he’s waiting for an opportunity to make a run for it, while Jim shoves his hands into his pockets and sits tensely in one of the chairs opposite the desk. “Morph” appears to have absconded to somewhere else for the time being, and Jim’s jiggling knee shows just how much he resents that fact.

Sarah takes the chair beside him, concern growing with every passing second. 

Amelia clears her throat primly and, still glancing occasionally at Jim, begins speaking. 

“Mrs. Hawkins, there were several incidents of note during the journey that I believe should be brought to your attention.” Her tone is deadly serious, and Sarah doesn’t miss the way Jim sinks down in his chair like a child about to be scolded. 

“Is everything okay?” She asks, even though it’s clear that very little, if anything, is okay.

Amelia sighs and appears to collect herself. 

“Mrs. Hawkins.” She starts again. “Due to some, unfortunate oversights,” She directs her gaze at Delbert, who is tellingly silent. “Part of the crew hired to accompany myself and my first mate on the journey were not who they said they were.” 

“It would appear that the majority of the men were a preformed crew of pirates, who joined as intended mutineers to try and take the treasure for themselves once we had collected it and were making the return journey.” 

Sarah thinks back to the night they found the map, when the inn was destroyed and she was sure a band of bloodthirsty killers were going to hunt them all down and kill them just for being in the wrong place at the wrong time. 

“With the exception of a few notable instances, it appears all of the delays we experienced during the expedition were the work of the pirate crew attempting to thin our numbers until we were able to be overpowered.” 

There’s pain in her eyes, Sarah sees, and she wonders who should have made it out of this mission alive that will never see port again. 

“What were the exceptions?” She asks.

The Captain looks up, apparently lost in thought, and recomposes herself.

“There was an incident involving a black hole, which we thankfully avoided the worst of with the help of Dr. Doppler here.” She indicates Delbert, who looks sheepishly proud. “And an apparent trap set upon the destination in question that I suspect leaves little of the planet to salvage.” 

“And the pirates?” Sarah asks, scared of the answer. 

Amelia’s expression sobers, somehow. She’s always been serious, but now her gaze turns icy and determined. Beside her, Sarah is aware of Jim slinking further down in his chair. 

The door makes a sound as Doppler exits, apparently taking his leave while he still has a chance, which doesn’t give Sarah much hope. Amelia follows the motion with her eyes, and waits until the sound of Doppler walking away fades with distance.

Amelia takes a long breath and seems to prepare herself, and the knot of dread in Sarah’s stomach reaches a peak.

“While accompanying us on the journey I sent young mister Hawkins to work for the man I deemed the least likely to cause him serious harm, in this case as a cabin boy under our cook.”

Jim flinches, but Sarah can’t look away. Amelia’s face is pained, like she’s delivering the worst news a mother can hear, and if he weren’t right next to her Sarah would be terrified for his survival.

She wants to reach out and squeeze his hand, but his posture says not to touch, and Sarah knows enough to respect that.

“It appears that he used this opportunity to take advantage of mister Hawkins, and later used him as a bargaining chip to regain the map and to take Doppler and myself hostage as well.” 

“He didn’t take advantage of me.” Jim argues, the first time he’s spoken since he called out to her when she first arrived on the ship.

Amelia’s expression hardens, and Sarah gets the impression she’s had this discussion more than once. 

“He manipulated all of us, mister Hawkins, you most of all.” She says back. Jim looks like he disagrees, and Sarah is still reeling from the news she’s received. 

“Where is he?” She asks, breaking up the heated staring contest. She's not sure why she wants to know, it's not like she can do anything the Captain or the courts won't do ten times over.

Amelia’s lips thin into a line.

“The remaining crew who weren’t killed in the escape were taken by the officials upon arrival, with the exception of mister Silver, who was nowhere to be found.” 

She levels an interrogating look at Jim, who is meeting her eyes with defiance now.

“I don’t know where he is.” He says, evenly, and the Captain’s ears twitch irritably. She turns to Sarah, a kind expression overtaking her annoyance.

“Mrs. Hawkins, I know this is difficult for you, but I believe the trauma your son has been through is clouding his judgement.”

She seems honestly concerned, not the kind of false sympathy the gossipers at the inn would have when asking faux innocently after the town troublemaker. Sarah wants to trust her, wants to help her boy.

“Jim?” She turns to him. She needs to see it in his eyes when he speaks. 

He looks at her, and the anger and determination in his eyes is unexpected. She’d been prepared for pain, for badly hidden hurt and the signs of abuse she’d missed so badly the first time. 

“I’m not traumatized.” He snaps, staring back at Amelia. 

“Your refusal to reveal his whereabouts is not something a healthy relationship would call for. I understand he was kind to you, James, but no amount of kindness can undo the harm he may have caused.” 

Jim folds his arms over his chest and leans back, stubborn. The Captain sighs. 

“Mister Hawkins, please. I am sorry for all you went through-” 

“I’m not a wilting fucking flower, Amelia.” He cuts her off with a growl.

“You were repeatedly forced into committing sexual acts by a man who had a great deal of power over you.” She points out icily.

“He never forced me to do anything!” He shouts, voice rising hysterically.

“Coercion is also a punishable offense, mister Hawkins.” 

“He was protecting me!” 

Amelia’s eyes narrow sharply. 

“Is that what he told you?” 

Jim looks like he wants very badly to backpedal. 

“The crew wanted to hurt me, and he kept me away from them.” He crosses his arms defensively instead, apparently holding his ground.

“So he convinced you the rest of the crew were not to be trusted, and that he alone could provide protection?” Amelia narrows her eyes further still and cocks one eyebrow.

“No! He never tried to convince me of anything. The crew wanted me dead and he prevented that.” 

“By taking you into his bed?” 

Jim is starting to get frustrated. 

“No, damn it, are you even listening to me?!” 

“I am, mister Hawkins, and all I am hearing is an exponentially increasing amount of reasons for Silver to face a noose.” 

Jim’s face goes pale, and Sarah doesn’t miss the real terror in his eyes. 

“He kept them from fucking raping me!” He screams, standing up from his chair. Sarah doesn’t even have time to process that remark because then Jim is continuing. “He could’ve let me die so many times and got away scot free, but he chose to save me! Doesn’t that mean anything at all?”

“Mister Hawkins, have you considered that he saw your actions as payment for his protection?” 

“It wasn’t a god damn exchange, Amelia! He was keeping me safe because he cares about me!” 

Amelia looks doubtful. She scribbles something in the ledger on her desk and Jim is breathing hard with suppressed rage. He looks livid, and Sarah can’t remember a time when her boy last looked like that. 

“I won’t testify against him.” Jim says, voice cold and angry and the Captain finally looks up from her ledger to level him with an icy glare. 

“There are multiple witnesses willing to testify against him for his part in the mutiny. I would like him to be punished to the full extent of the law, but realistically mister Hawkins, your testimony is not needed for him to be hanged.” 

Jim is looking more frightened by the minute. Sarah is still reeling from the back and forth of the argument, but she has the cognition to see the way Jim’s brain is working and trying to figure a way out. 

“I pursued him, okay?!” Jim shouts. He plants his hands on the desk and leans forward with a ferocity Sarah hasn’t seen in years burning in his eyes. “If you’re gonna punish anybody punish me!” 

“You are not the adult in the situation, mister Hawkins, and as such the instigator of the actions is irrelevant.” Amelia also stands, matching Jim’s position with infinitely more poise and grace. “He should have turned you down.” 

“He did!”

“Clearly he did not, at least where it matters.” 

“I’m stubborn.” Jim growls back. “He told me to leave it and I wouldn’t, okay? It’s dumb but I don’t regret it.” Desperation makes his voice crack.

“Regret has nothing to do with it, mister Hawkins. Unfortunately for all involved you are a minor, and legally incapable of making your own decisions.” 

She sits down again, apparently done with the conversation, and Jim has a look of heartbreak on his face. 

“Now, mister Hawkins, his whereabouts.” A look of pity crosses her face as Jim curls in on himself, eyes unfocused and darting around at things only he can see. 

“If he’s tried with the rest of the crew, there’s a chance he can obtain a pardon by testifying against the other pirates.” Amelia tries gently, though it appears to physically pain her to offer this small hope.

Jim shakes his head, a bitter smile curling his lips.

“I can’t tell you.” He smiles sadly. He’s crying, Sarah notices, fear shining in the blue of his eyes but steadfast in his decision. “The court won’t pardon a mutineer, much less the leader, and I won’t be the one to send him to hang. You want him?” He snorts. “Good fucking luck.”

A sneer crosses his face at that and Amelia’s pity turns to exasperation. 

“Please, mister Hawkins, come to your senses.” She pleads.

“He’s not going to.” Sarah says, quiet and sad and scared. She knows what Jim is thinking, why he won’t give up this man who, by all accounts, should have earned his ire and then some. 

“You’re never going to, are you?” Jim finally turns his gaze to his mother and sees the tears in her eyes. 

He winces at the look on her face, but Sarah knows he’s aware that she’s figured it out. He rips his eyes away. His silence speaks volumes and even Amelia seems to sense that whatever unsaid thing passed between them is powerful enough to stop the argument in its tracks.

“I can’t tell you.” He says again, and Sarah grabs his hand. 

“I know, sweetheart.” 

“Mrs. Hawkins, please tell me you aren’t suggesting what I think you are.” Amelia cuts in, sounding more scandalized by the second.

Sarah doesn’t answer, and Amelia switches her gaze to Jim instead.

“James?” 

He looks up and meets her eyes with a challenging stare. Stubborn and headstrong even as he’s scared to death.

Amelia must know she’s not getting any more information out of Jim. She closes her eyes and breathes out through her nose, and when she looks at them again she’s once again perfectly composed. 

“The officials have requested you remain nearby for when the trial against the pirates begin. Other than that, mister Hawkins, you are free to leave.” 

She’s barely finished her sentence before Jim’s chair is scraping along the floor and he’s leaving, storming out without another word. 

Sarah stands more sedately, still taking in all the information she’d been given. Amelia stands as well, straightening her jackets primly and offering the other woman one final word on the subject.

“I am truly sorry Mrs. Hawkins. Had I known...” She trails off, staring into the middle distance forlornly. 

“How has he been? Jim, I mean.” She asks. 

Amelia looks taken aback. She brushes a bit of dust off her desk, potentially stalling for time.

“I cannot honestly say.” She answers finally. 

“He was not terribly interested in my company, outside of operating the map he never showed any inclination to spend time around either myself or Doppler.”

She looks down, unwilling to meet Sarah’s eyes.

“I can’t say whether the time he spent with the pirates was entirely voluntary or not. He seemed content, when I saw him.”

“Are you sure he was…” Sarah doesn’t want to say it.

“I cannot see a scenario in which he wasn’t, given the information I am now privy to.” She answers, and for all the guilt in her eyes, Sarah at least appreciates the honesty.

Silence reigns for a moment, and then Sarah sighs and collects herself to step back out into the world. 

“Thank you, Captain.” She says. “I’ll talk to him.” 

Amelia just nods before turning back to her desk. The ledger is still open, and Sarah can see the Captain’s neat handwriting along with the rough, wide-set hand of someone else. As she’s closing the door behind her, she sees the Captain’s hand brush over the other lettering wistfully.

* * *

The ride home feels longer than it’s ever been.

Sarah takes her boy with her, hoping the prospect of some rest will help him ease down from the adrenaline of the past few days. Doppler promises to be home shortly, wrapping up some affairs while the Hawkins’ head for their temporary residence. 

She’s still in shock, a little. The entire trip is made in deathly silence, Jim staring out the shuttle window and refusing to even look at her. Even Morph cooing softly from Jim’s shoulder isn’t enough to get more than a cursory pet out of the boy.

Sarah, for her part, has no idea what to say. That helpless loss for words follows her as they land and take the carriage to Doppler’s estate, and then entering the library with their footsteps echoing softly in the stacks upon stacks of books. 

Jim is slouching again. His posture is hunched and nervous, and whenever she goes to look at him his gaze snaps away like he’s scared of getting caught looking. 

Finally Sarah can’t take it. She grabs her son by the sleeve and drags him to a table, sitting across from him and holding his hand in hers so tightly he winces before she relaxes her grasp. 

“Jim, please talk to me.” She pleads. 

His eyes meet hers for a moment before they’re flickering away again. He’s nervous and she wishes she knew what he was thinking. 

The silence reigns for a long moment, and in the warm light of the library the bruises on his face and neck are in stark relief. 

“Who did that to you?” She asks, afraid of the answer. 

This topic seems to be safer, strangely enough. He blinks at the world outside the window, surprised, and turns back to her with a less guarded expression. 

“One of the crew.” He rasps. He touches the split above his eye gingerly, flinching at the touch. “None of them were nice, but one guy in particular really had it out for me.” 

“He caught me trying to escape when we were on the planet. He got a few hits, messed up my leg pretty bad.” He pulls up the leg of his pants to reveal a line of abraised flesh surrounding several deep gashes in his calf. 

“Silver got the worst of it.” He mutters, something Sarah wonders if she was even supposed to hear.

The silence takes hold of them again. Jim looks away, shame looking strange on his face. He was never ashamed of getting into trouble, before. The expression on his face when he was dragged in by the officers was always one of annoyance or anger.

A terrible thought occurs to her, as she’s eyeing the mark around his neck. 

“Did…  _ he _ give you any of those?” She asks.

Jim looks like he forgot she was there. His eyes go wide and instantly he’s shaking his head frantically. Anyone else might be concerned he’s lying, but she knows all her son’s tells. He’s telling the truth.

“No, he’d never hurt me.” He says with the kind of confidence Sarah can barely remember having herself. 

“He-” Jim starts, before cutting off. He bites his lip and wraps his arms around himself. 

“I was mad at him, at first.” He says. “He never told me, and I was angry at him, for lying.” 

Jim looks like it hurts him to admit this. 

“But he- he protected me.” The words are quiet, soft like they could drift away on the wind if he isn’t careful. 

“He killed one of his men for me, to save me.”

Sarah manages to suppress her knee-jerk reaction of horror with incredible restraint. She reminds herself that Jim was very likely in danger of dying had the unnamed man not been stopped, and finds some slightly guilty gratitude that her son survived to tell the tale.

“You love him, don’t you?”

Jim won’t look at her. His eyes are averted and he closes them before he opens his mouth.

“Yeah.” He whispers, like he wishes it wasn’t the case. Morph, who had been resting peacefully in Jim’s pocket, floats out and rubs against Jim’s cheek, cooing sympathetically.

He smiles, watery and sad, and pats the blob gently, and Sarah gets the feeling his new pet means more to him than just a companion.

Her heart aches for Jim. Her boy who has always been so sweet and earnest, and who craves affection but is hesitant to let others in enough to show it. He deserves better than the hurt he’s had in his life, deserves better than anyone can give him, in her opinion. 

But she remembers what it was like, to have her parents tell her she was picking the wrong man. They were right, in the end, but she was so hurt by their reaction that she refused to go back, even after Leland walked out. 

She’s not going to do that to her boy. 

She’s not happy about this, but she knows if she tries to stop him he’ll be angry, and she isn’t willing to abandon Jim when he needs her. So she’ll suck it up, and gently encourage him to find someone his own age, and pray that he ends up safe and happy, but she won’t fight him on this.

Sarah gets up and walks around the table to sit with her boy, squeezing his hand. Jim looks up at her, relief coloring his gaze as she pulls him into a crushing hug. 

“I’m okay, mom. I’m gonna be okay.” He tells her, and there’s such honest belief in his voice that she believes it too.


End file.
